Everton get the job done against Fleetwood

Fleetwood 0 - 1 Everton

Everton edged their way past Fleetwood Town to book a place in the third round of the Carabao Cup thanks to Demarai Gray's solitary first-half goal.

The winger scored his second goal in three days when Dwight McNeil capitalised on a mistake by Brendan Sarpong-Wiredu and fed Alex Iwobi who teed Gray up to place a shot past Jakub Stolarczyk with 28 minutes on the clock.

It was a goal that Frank Lampard’s men had been threatening after an earlier shot by McNeil had been diverted behind by Drew Baker’s sliding block, Ruben Vinagre had come close to picking Salmon Rondon’s head out with a cross from the left and all three of Iwobi, McNeil and Rondon had miscued with efforts on goal.

For their part, Fleetwood had started adventurously enough with Cian Hayes driving past debutant Reece Welch in Everton’s defence but being muscled out by Michael Keane and Jed Garner seeing a shot charged down by Seamus Coleman.

But in what was a fairly comfortable first half for the Toffees, who had to make a change to their starting XI before kick-off when Tom Davies pulled up injured in the warm-up, it was on the opposition players that Scott Brown’s overly-physical team left their mark rather on the scoreboard.

Amadou Onana, starting a match for the first time since arriving from Lille earlier this month, was kicked from pillar to post all evening and Vinagre was barged into the advertising hoardings off the ball by Sean Rooney before Jed Garner was finally booked for a heavy, late tackle on Onana.

It wasn’t until the stroke of half-time that Asmir Begovic was tested in the Everton goal but he handily beat away a powerful Hayes effort and then saved from Harvey Macadam.

Brown had clearly instructed the Cods to have a go in the second half as they came out with a good deal more purpose to their play and Begovic had to bat the ball behind as it looped off Welch from a free-kick following a late challenge by Vinagre on Baker.

Nathan Patterson had a good chance to double the lead shortly before he was replaced by the impressive Lewis Warrington but powered his effort straight at the keeper while, at the other end, Begovic had to be alert to deny Hayes who had again got around the outside of Welch.

Onana saw a header bounce off a defender and narrowly clear the bar after Iwobi had headed a corner back across goal and Rondon’s shot from the angle was charged down but there would be no further addition to the score as Lampard was able to hand another debut to Stanley Mills as Everton comfortable saw the game out.

 

• Matchday updates and reaction
• Third round draw

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